Portable medical devices having wireless data communication capabilities are becoming increasingly popular, especially for patients that have conditions that must be monitored on a continuous or frequent basis. For example, diabetics are usually required to modify and monitor their daily lifestyle to keep their body in balance, in particular, their blood glucose (BG) levels. Individuals with Type 1 diabetes and some individuals with Type 2 diabetes use insulin to control their BG levels. To do so, diabetics routinely keep strict schedules, including ingesting timely nutritious meals, partaking in exercise, monitoring BG levels daily, and adjusting and administering insulin dosages accordingly. Diabetics may utilize wireless medical devices that are deployed in a network environment in a manner that facilitates data communication between two or more separate devices.
The prior art includes a number of insulin pump systems that are designed to deliver accurate and measured doses of insulin via infusion sets (an infusion set delivers the insulin through a small diameter tube that terminates at a cannula inserted under the patient's skin). In lieu of a syringe, the patient can simply activate the insulin pump to administer an insulin bolus as needed, for example, in response to the patient's current BG level. A patient can measure his BG level using a BG measurement device, such as a test strip meter, a continuous glucose measurement system, or the like. BG measurement devices use various methods to measure the BG level of a patient, such as a sample of the patient's blood, a sensor in contact with a bodily fluid, an optical sensor, an enzymatic sensor, or a fluorescent sensor. When the BG measurement device has generated a BG measurement, the measurement is displayed on the BG measurement device. A continuous glucose monitoring system can monitor the patient's BG level in real time.
Insulin pumps and other portable medical devices may also be configured to communicate with remote controller devices, monitoring or display devices, BG meters, and other devices associated with such an infusion system. It may be desirable to use multiple wireless controller devices to remotely control one medical device, such as an infusion pump. For example, a patient having a wearable or otherwise portable infusion device may have one or more controller devices at home, another controller device at the office, and yet another controller device in a vehicle. Moreover, it may be desirable to enable different people to remotely control a single infusion device. Thus, the patient may have one wireless controller, and a caregiver (such as a parent) may have another wireless controller, both having independent control capabilities. Furthermore, a patient may use two different remotely controllable medical devices, which may be wirelessly controlled by one or more wireless controllers.
The communication, processing, and execution of remote control commands is somewhat straightforward in a basic medical device system having only one medical device and only one corresponding wireless controller device. As more compatible devices are introduced, however, conflicting or redundant instructions and commands might be issued concurrently (or very close in time) by different controller devices. Conflicting or duplicative commands may be tolerable or troublesome, depending upon the functions or features associated with those commands. Consequently, it becomes increasingly important to manage, regulate, and coordinate the manner in which control commands are handled and processed in a medical device system having a plurality of controller devices for one medical device.
A personal infusion system, such as an insulin infusion system that is worn or carried by a patient, might utilize consumable, refillable, or replaceable parts, components, or items. For example, an insulin infusion pump may cooperate with replaceable or replenishable items such as a continuous glucose sensor, an infusion set, and an insulin reservoir. Such consumables can usually be obtained from a physician, from the equipment manufacturer, and/or from a pharmacy. Some existing infusion systems include reminder or alert features that notify the user whenever it is time to replace or refill a consumable item.
The prior art includes portable medical devices that utilize display elements, which can be used to display information associated with the operation of the medical devices. For example, the display element of an insulin infusion pump (or a remote controller device for the pump) can be used to display a graph, a chart, or other visual representation of data related to the patient and/or to the operation of the pump. In this regard, the pump might display a graph of the patient's glucose level versus time. Due to the small size of the display element of a portable pump device, the time period displayed at any given moment will be limited (e.g., two hours, four hours, twelve hours). If the visible time scale is changed without altering the vertical scale, the slope characteristics of the graphed data will change accordingly. Thus, a relatively high slope (whether increasing or decreasing) may have more or less significance, depending upon the chosen time scale. Consequently, the user may not fully appreciate the significance of slope trends and variations in the charted data, unless the user is always aware of the selected time scale.
Certain types of portable medical devices may implement security features to ensure that sensitive, private, or important functions are not accidentally activated, and/or to ensure that such functions can only be activated by authorized individuals. For example, an infusion pump or specific functions of the pump may be password protected to ensure that only the patient or an authorized caregiver can administer therapy with the pump. Conventional security measures can be cumbersome, difficult to program, and/or inconvenient for the user. For example, usernames and passwords rely on memorization, which introduces human error. Moreover, usernames and passwords can be compromised if the user discloses them to others or documents them in a manner that can be accessed by unauthorized persons.